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Raspberry Pi Simulation & Emulation

Simulating or emulating a Raspberry Pi allows for software development and testing without physical hardware.

QEMU​

The most versatile open-source emulator. It can emulate the ARM CPU and many of the Raspberry Pi's peripherals.

Renode​

A powerful framework for complex IoT systems simulation, supporting multi-node networks. It has good support for various ARM architectures and peripherals.

VIC (Virtual Infrastructure for Chips)​

A hardware-in-the-loop simulation tool often used for professional IC design and testing.

Use Cases​

  • Kernel Development: Debugging early boot code without constant SD card flashing.
  • CI/CD Pipelines: Automated testing of Raspberry Pi OS images in the cloud.
  • Education: Learning Linux and ARM assembly without purchasing hardware.
  • Network Simulation: Testing distributed systems across multiple virtualized Pi nodes.

Troubleshooting Resources​